Water Quality as a Land Use Determinant for the Bear Lake Valley, Utah-Idaho

by Street, Hayden L.

The goal of this research has been to prove that changes in water quality resulting from changes in land use could result in a threatened decrease in economic utility of land uses in the Bear Lake Valley. The purpose of this research was to illustrate a process for determining land use and water quality relationships in the Bear Lake Valley that utilized quantified data and projective models. The first phase of the research estimated the changes in land uses and demographics for the valley. The second phase of research utilized the results from the first phase together with models predicting changes in water quality developed from the literature, to predict water quality changes. Other necessary data required for the models was obtained from an extensive inventory of existing data and literature from state, federal, and local sources. The results from the second phase were then compared to state and federal water quality standards to estimate if the changes in water quality threaten.